This interview covers Telegram founder Pavel Durov's philosophy of running a tiny core team (~40 people) to serve 1 billion users, and why he refuses to monetize user data. He's bullish on Bitcoin, predicting $1 million and saying his personal expenses come from Bitcoin bought in 2013, not Telegram. Key holdings: Telegram (profitable for the first time in 2024 via subscriptions and blockchain), Bitcoin (Durov's personal financial backbone), and the Ton blockchain (used for Telegram's NFT and username trading). He reveals he gave up ~80% of potential ad revenue by rejecting targeted ads based on user data.
Lex Fridman’s in-depth conversation with Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov focused on free speech, user privacy protection, and technology philosophy. Durov emphasized that Telegram has over 1 billion active users, continues to innovate with a very small engineering team, and has pioneered numero
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Durov detailed the early evolution of VK's technology stack:
Key Data: When Durov met Mark Zuckerberg in Silicon Valley in 2009, VK's page load speed had already surpassed Facebook's, which sparked significant curiosity from the Facebook team at the time.
Durov proposed a highly compelling quantitative model:
> Telegram is used by over 1 billion users, opened dozens of times daily. If each open incurs a 0.5-second delay, multiplied by billions of times, humanity would waste hundreds or even thousands of years of life unnecessarily.
This perspective elevates code efficiency to the level of moral responsibility—every developer's carelessness translates into wasted time for global users.
Telegram's technical independence far exceeds industry standards:
| Technology Layer | Telegram's Approach | Industry Norm |
|---|---|---|
| Backend Programming Language | In-house developed | Uses existing languages (Python/Go/Java) |
| Database Engine | In-house developed | Uses MySQL/PostgreSQL |
| Web Server | In-house developed (partially) | Uses Nginx/Apache |
| Encryption Algorithm | In-house developed MTProto | Uses existing libraries (e.g., OpenSSL) |
| Client Code | Open source + reproducible builds | Closed source or partially open source |
Reproducible builds are a unique security feature of Telegram—users can verify that the binary downloaded from the App Store is identical to the source code on GitHub. This is a standard that WhatsApp, Signal, and iMessage have all failed to achieve.
Durov entered the experimental school of St. Petersburg State University at age 11, where the curriculum design was nothing short of extreme:
Durov is highly critical of the trend toward eliminating competition in education:
> If you remove competition from the education system, children will compete elsewhere—such as in video games.
He observes that after some Western countries abolished public grading and rankings, while short-term anxiety decreased, it led to:
Durov believes mathematics is the only discipline that encourages independent thinking rather than repeating others' viewpoints. This ability directly translates into problem-solving skills in programming and entrepreneurship.
Telegram’s core engineering team consists of only about 40 people (including backend, frontend, designers, and system administrators), supporting over 1 billion users.
Durov put forward a disruptive view:
> I once had an experience where firing one engineer actually improved the team’s productivity.
Reason analysis:
Telegram selects talent through public programming competitions, with advantages including:
Durov revealed the design process behind Telegram’s default gradient background:
The implementation challenges of the "Thanos snap" effect (messages disintegrating into particles):
Telegram’s vector animated stickers (launched in 2015) led WhatsApp by approximately 3 years and 8 months:
| Feature | Telegram | |
|---|---|---|
| Format | Vector animation | GIF/WebM |
| File size | A few KB – 30 KB | Hundreds of KB – several MB |
| Frame rate | 60 FPS | Variable |
| Scaling quality | Infinite | Pixelated |
Telegram achieved profitability for the first time in 2024, with the path including:
1. Premium Subscriptions: Over 15 million paying users, generating annual revenue exceeding $500 million
2. Contextual Advertising: Based on channel topics, not user personal data
3. Blockchain Integration: NFTs (gifts) and username trading on the Ton chain
4. Mini-App Commissions: Only 5%, far below the 30% charged by Apple/Google
Durov explicitly stated that by refusing targeted advertising based on user data, Telegram has foregone approximately 80% of its potential advertising revenue.
Durov revealed that his personal living expenses (including private jets and high-end rentals) are not funded by Telegram but rather by Bitcoin investments initiated in 2013. He firmly believes that Bitcoin will reach $1 million.
Durov described the details of his detention by French police:
Durov disclosed two instances of pressure from French intelligence agencies:
| Event | Demand | Durov’s Response |
|---|---|---|
| Moldova election | Ban dozens of channels | Banned only the few that violated rules, refused the rest |
| Romania election | Ban channels of a conservative candidate | Publicly refused and disclosed the meeting’s content |
Key turning point: After the Moldova incident, French intelligence agencies "put in a good word" with the investigating judge, leading Durov to realize the investigation may have been politically motivated.
> Ukrainians say you work for Russia, Russians say you work for Ukraine.
Durov noted that governments want Telegram to protect free speech in rival countries, but demand censorship in their own countries.
Durov first publicly disclosed the 2018 assassination attempt:
Durov proposed a thought experiment based on the many-worlds interpretation:
> Perhaps every time I die, my consciousness shifts to another parallel universe where I did not die. Eventually, we would achieve quantum immortality—living to 1,000 years old, while other versions of us have long since perished.
| Dimension | Telegram | Industry Average / Competitors |
|---|---|---|
| Core Engineering Team | ~40 people | Hundreds to thousands |
| Number of Servers | ~100,000 | Varies by scale |
| Automation Level | Nearly fully automated | Heavy manual operations |
| Founder Shareholding | 100% | Typically <20% |
| Advertising Revenue Foregone | ~80% | 0% |
| Open-Source Reproducible Builds | Yes (iOS + Android) | None |
| End-to-End Encryption Launch | 2013 | WhatsApp 2016 |
| Vector Stickers Launch | 2015 | WhatsApp 2018 |
Durov’s entire career—from VK to Telegram—has been a protracted battle against systemic alienation. He faces not a single government, but a global trend: bureaucracies, intelligence agencies, and commercial competitors all seek to reduce individuals to controllable "cases."
Yet Durov’s response remains consistent: non-cooperation, no fear, no compromise. He chooses to build his own defense system through technology (encryption, automation, open source) and philosophy (Stoicism, quantum immortality).
As he said at the end of the interview:
> I would rather lose everything than yield to this pressure. If you yield, you become an empty shell of yourself on a deep biological and spiritual level.
This may be the answer that Kafka’s Josef K. never found—not waiting for the trial, but refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the court.